At least 200 firms in the United Kingdom have signed up to implement a permanent four-day working week for all their employees with no loss of pay, reported ‘The Guardian’.
Even as there is continuous debate about long working hours in India, especially after comments about 90-hour and 70-hour workweeks from industry leaders, there is some cheer for employees in the UK.
According to a report in The Guardian, at least 200 firms in the United Kingdom have signed up to implement a permanent four-day working week for all their employees with no loss of pay.
According to the news report, this move comes after the latest campaign to reinvent the UK’s working environment.
According to the ‘4 Day Week Foundation’, a not-for-profit that promotes a four-day working week in Britain, these 200 companies employ more than 5,000 people and operate in sectors like charities, marketing, and technology, among others.
Highlighting the “five-day work week” as a hangover from the earlier economic age, Joe Ryle, the campaign director of the foundation, told The Guardian that, “9-5, the five-day working week was invented 100 years ago and is no longer fit for purpose. We are long overdue an update.”
Ryle also focused on how this four-day workweek can be a “win-win” situation for workers and employers.
“50% more free time, a four-day week gives people the freedom to live happier, more fulfilling lives,” he told the news portal.
“As hundreds of British companies and one local council have already shown, a four-day week with no loss of pay can be a win-win for both workers and employers,” Joe Ryle adds.
Companies leading four-day workweek
Out of the total 200 companies adopting the four-day working week, 30 are from the marketing, advertising, and press relations sectors.
Another 29 companies, including those in charity, NGOs, and the social care industry, have also supported this initiative. The report highlights that 24 companies from technology, IT, and software segments and 22 companies from business, consulting, and management sectors have similarly offered their employees permanent four-day working weeks.
The supporters of the four-day working week claimed that it is a useful way of attracting and retaining employees in the firm and boosting productivity to deliver the same output in fewer hours, reported the news portal.
In the UK, out of these 200 companies, 59 are based in London, as per the report.
Work-from-home debate
The global pandemic of Covid-19 in 2020 forced a worldwide shift to work-from-home methods. And, transitioning back to work from the office has proven challenging.
Multiple media reports indicate that US-based companies like JPMorgan Chase, Amazon, and others have issued strict mandates requiring employees to attend work in person and maintain a five-day workweek schedule.
In the UK, many Starling Bank employees who supported work-from-home resigned after their CEO demanded they spend more time in the office, according to The Guardian.
Nearly 78 per cent of employees within the age bracket of 18 to 34 years of age in the UK expect that a five-day work week will become the norm in the next five years, and 65 per cent of them said they do not want to return full-time office work, according to the news report citing Spark Market Research data.